The King, the Knight, and the Rook
by black.k.kat
Summary: Companion piece to Black King Takes White Knight. Eliot has to wonder if Nate has ever met a problem he can't solve. Slight slash, team!fic.


**Rating:** Teen (for Eliot's language)

**Word count:** ~ 3,200

**Warnings: **. Romance. Slight slash (of the Elliot/Nate persuasion). English from a non-native. The usual.

**Disclaimer: **All recognizable characters are the property of their respective owners. I am in no way associated with the creators, and no copyright infringement is intended.

**A/N: **This is a companion piece to _Black King Takes White Knight_, told from Eliot's POV. I love Eliot as a character, personally (and you might notice the slight hero-worship I have of Nate going on here), and Eliot/Nate is one of my favorite slash pairings _ever_. Anyway, more rambling, but I was listening to _Cadillac Cowboy_ by Chris LeDoux while writing this—hilarious, wonderful song, even though I'm not overly fond of most country.

* * *

_**The King, the Knight, and the Rook**_

Sometimes, Eliot has to wonder if Nate has ever met a problem he can't solve.

There's the obvious, of course—his son, his marriage, his life as a paragon of good—but those aren't really _problems_. They're facts, and Nate handles them about as well as most people—which is to say, not at all.

It's been two and a half weeks since they caught Damien Moreau, and half the time Eliot wakes up absolutely certain that it's a dream, that they're still going after his underlings or—as his nightmares sometimes convince him—have all been caught and are awaiting execution.

But they're not, and they haven't, and Damien Moreau is out of their lives forever. Success is a heady thing, and Nathan Ford is the one man who can ensure it no matter the odds.

Sure he's human. Sure he's fallible. But when the chips are down, when the heat is on and it really counts, Nate always manages to pull through, producing miracles like some two-bit magician pulling rabbits out of a hat. Working his crew they've all gotten used to the impossible becoming possible. Eliot still remembers Sophie's words to Maggie, during the Blackpoole mess—_the universe does seem to bend itself to his bizarre machinations._ It's true, and Eliot's never been gladder for it.

The clock numbers flicker and change, and Eliot sighs, giving up on sleep for the night. Three a.m. and he's still wide awake, like they caught Moreau yesterday instead of several continents, a handful of countries, and seventeen days ago. He's not exactly _tense_, but it's close. There was so much that could have gone wrong, so much that could have happened, so much that Eliot could have screwed up keeping his mouth shut about Moreau. And yet they all got away scot-free, out of the Italian's grasp and back to what they used to be. They're a stronger crew for it, and Eliot is smart enough to recognize that what the woman did, coming to blackmail them the day Nate got out of prison, helped them overcome all of the awkwardness in Nate's return, all of their feelings of betrayal and worry for this odd, brilliant man who gave them all a place to belong.

Eliot isn't very good with things like that. It's been a long time since he's had any kind of home that wasn't a bolthole somewhere dark and filthy. He looks around his apartment now, and he can see all the differences. There are little trinkets from Parker and her international forays, a few paintings from Sophie that are rather ugly but still appealing, an entertainment system that Hardison tweaked himself. Little bits of the people he works with pushing into his private life, unasked and unlooked for. But he can't remember a time when he was more content, when he was happier than he is now. Part of it is the act of protecting—not just the clients, but his crew. He can save them even from themselves, and that's a heady feeling. Parker and her odd empathy, Hardison and his too-big heart, Sophie and her brazen confidence, Nate and his overly sharp focus—they all need him.

No one's really needed him in a long time.

In among the others' gifts, Nate has left his own mark. It's not anything concrete, nothing Eliot can actually touch, but it's there nevertheless. A sense of rightness, a knowledge that he's doing the right thing and _helping_ people…it's changed Eliot. For the better, he's fairly certain. Being a hitter on a crew, or even alone, means that he's making big bucks solely to hurt someone else. But on Nate's crew it seems different. The marks are quantifiably _bad_, which means that they're doing _good_ in taking them down.

This one girl Eliot dated for a while was always talking about karma and balances and divine reckoning. Obviously, that romance was short-lived, but if Eliot believed in that kind of thing—not that he does, mind—he'd probably feel the karmic scales realigning or some shit like that. He has nothing to make up for, not really—he did what he had to do to survive, and always has—but…maybe this is him trying to put an equal amount of good into the world, to balance out the pain.

Nate's the reason for that, the cause of him feeling this way. What was it Hardison had said, that first job after their six-month break? "_You took the world's greatest thieves and you broke us_." Oddly apt, like a lot of what Hardison says. Nate broke them out of their old molds and poured them into new ones, reshaped them into people who aren't just in it for the profit anymore. And maybe it's part of that process, but Eliot can't bring himself to feel bitter or even faintly resentful about it. This is who he has become, who he is now, and it's acceptable. Were it anything but, Eliot would be long gone, would leave and run and never look back.

But this…this is good.

He feels restless for some reason, even after the long night. It's cold outside, the wind howling down the streets with icy teeth, but Eliot gets his coat anyway and heads out. He has no place to be, no one he feels like visiting for a little bedroom recreation, no driving need to escape and get somewhere safe. That's something new, as well. He feels _safe_ here in Boston, shadowing Nate on his daily business and learning the city by night. Never, ever before has he put down roots, but here, now, it almost feels like he could be doing just that.

And then there's Nate and his blue-green eyes, always looking and planning, six and a half steps ahead and two to the side. It's highly possible the man is just a little insane, but Eliot _likes_ the way he is, brilliant and just a bit left of center. Back before Nate exchanged a knight's white armor for a king's black crown, when he chased Eliot all the way across Eastern Europe and halfway across Russia, he was one of the only insurance investigators that Eliot would have trusted to keep his word. And Nate did. If you didn't kill anyone, if you kept to a code, Nathan Ford would let you go rather than turn you in. A lot of the people in his position lined their pockets with bribes and payoffs, but Nathan Ford did no such thing. He was an honest man in a world of dishonest crooks, but he not only survived against the odds, he _thrived_.

Eliot likes to think that he always saw the thief under the insurance man's skin, the little bit of crooked that made him so damned good at thinking like those he chased. Likes to think that he's a part of the reason Nate's now firmly a thief, declared and witnessed. He's an honest thief, but that's what they're all on the road to becoming, so it's all right.

The white armor is gone, discarded at the feet of twisted, rotten men like Ian Blackpoole. The black king has claimed his crown, and sits firmly on his liar's throne. They're all his subjects now, arrayed at his feet, and Eliot can't think of a single place in all the world that he'd rather be.

The bright lights of a twenty-four-hour market catch his eye, and he pauses on the sidewalk, considering the rows of fruits and vegetables he can see through the door. Left alone, Nate would live on coffee and nothing else, but Eliot likes to bring him food anyway, likes to cook in his spacious kitchen. There's a certain satisfaction to be had in such domesticity, and in the fact that even when Nate cooks for himself, he doesn't rearrange Eliot's kitchen setup. Nate _can_ cook, and rather well, but Eliot likes to feed him. It's an imitation of intimacy, and probably the closest Eliot will ever be allowed to get to _real_ intimacy.

It's just a little after three-thirty in the morning, but Eliot goes into the store anyway, gets a basket, and picks out enough groceries for a week. Nate's sleeping habits reflect his coffee-drinking habits—namely, that he drinks far too much coffee, even now that he drinks alcohol again, and never sleeps more than a few hours a time. Though, now that Eliot considers it, he's always been like that. No matter what time Eliot goes to his apartment, he's usually awake, reading or on the computer or playing chess against himself. The latter is always entertaining to watch, because Nate's one of the few people Eliot's met who actually gets _competitive_ playing alone. But he almost has to play alone, because no one else can keep up. Hell, Nate managed to get all the way to the top of an international chess tournament against the best players in the world, and he was hardly even _serious _then.

The sleepy clerk at the checkout stand smiles at him and flirts a bit, and Eliot flirts back even though he doesn't particularly want it to go anywhere. There's only been one person for him for a while now—months, if he's honest; ever since they split up the first time and he realized just how boring his life really was without a mastermind there to challenge him. Eliot's not one to get himself into hopeless situations—not unless Nate's involved in the planning somewhere, which neatly negates the "hopeless" part—but crushing like some stupid schoolgirl on a divorced ex-seminary student? That's a bit like beating his head against a titanium wall while standing in quick-setting concrete. There are far less painful ways to go.

Problem is, Eliot's a bit of a masochist when it comes to relationships. He either goes for short, meaningless flings or long, tortured, drawn-out disasters that end with him halfway around the world and two hearts shattered. Like with Aimee—that kind of masochism. And Nate already has a bad track record. Even if he was interested, even if he didn't think it was an unforgiveable sin—and Eliot's up in the air about that, because he can never quite get a bead on the way Nate's head works—he probably wouldn't be interested in someone with as many failed relationships under his belt as Eliot. Or perhaps not failed, which is even worse—he simply didn't put the effort into it, and let them drift.

But he let them drift in favor of the crew, and somehow Eliot knows that if he ever starts anything with Nate, it will be just as important as the crew, if not more so.

Nate's a conman—the _best_ conman, honestly, that Eliot has ever encountered. He makes that guy who sold the Eiffel Tower a few dozen times look like a rank amateur. It's entirely possible that Nate's been scamming all of them, all this time. He could be someone entirely different than who he appears to be—that's always the problem with falling for a conman. But there's always been a core of _Nate_ in whatever scheme the mastermind is pulling, whether he's playing a cowboy investor or a three-star general. Nate's not the world's greatest actor, but he doesn't have to be. He plays to his strengths, and people see that and believe in it. _Eliot_ believes in it. After everything that they've done together, it's impossible not to, and Eliot Spencer doesn't believe in any impossible scenarios that don't have Nathan Ford backing them.

The bar is dark and quiet when he unlocks the door and steps in, out of the biting cold and the starting rain. Nate gave them all keys to this part, even if he stubbornly refuses to let them have the key to his apartment. Not that it matters, because Eliot can't remember the last time he knocked on the door. It's easier—and safer—to pick it, rather than risk waking Nate if he's actually asleep, or arguing with him if he isn't. He always gives in eventually, but Eliot's carrying milk and eggs, and he doesn't want to waste time getting them in the fridge. Better just to pick the lock and ignore Nate's grumbling.

It's already been picked, though—some of the scratches on the keyhole are fresh. Scratches mean Hardison, because Parker's too much of a professional to leave traces like that and Sophie forged a copy of the key weeks ago. Eliot picks it, too, because he can, and pushes in to see Parker and Hardison already there, sitting on the couch with Nate. Hardison and Nate both have coffee, which Eliot takes to mean Hardison has been here longer, and that's all the observation he has time for before Parker is up and in his face, waving a black knight under his nose.

"Eliot! Look! Nate is picking out chess pieces for us," she says with far too much energy for the hour, and Eliot has to raise an eyebrow at the face that Nate pegged her as a _knight_. He would have said bishop, personally, but when he looks up, that's the piece Hardison is holding. He looks over to Nate, who shrugs at him and offers that faintly wry smile Eliot sees so often when personal feelings are involved or Nate's feeling uncomfortable.

"They asked," the mastermind says, and it's like a defense, as though because they asked he _had_ to tell them.

And maybe he did, because Eliot knows Nate sees all of them as family. _His_ family, and not some outside group. The man went to _prison_ for them, to keep them out of Sterling's hands. Parker and Hardison look up to him like the father neither of them ever had. Sophie's the fashionable aunt, and Eliot…

Eliot's not entirely sure where he stands in the group, but he knows damn well where he _wants_ to be.

Another moment of consideration and he can see why Nate chose the way he did. Good choices, too—Parker and Hardison fit their pieces, or their pieces fit them. He nods and lifts a brow at Nate in query. "Me? And if you so much as look at the queen I'll kill you slowly." Because the queen is Sophie's chessman, that much is obvious, and Eliot wants nothing to do with it even if it's in the place he covets.

Nate flashes him a smile—one of those blink-and-you'll-miss-it grins that light up his whole face and don't appear nearly enough in Eliot's opinion. He seems to understand just what the question—and its answer—means to Eliot, though, because he barely even hesitates before tossing over not one chessman, but two.

There might be a mumbled apology somewhere in there, but Eliot can't hear it; all of his attention is on the rook and knight. And isn't that a speaking choice where he's concerned—steadfast and unpredictable, defense and offense. If this is how Nate sees him, there might be a chance for something after all. That kind of regard—it's heady, and there has to be meaning behind it. He smiles, just a little, at the thought and turns to put the groceries away.

The knight and the castle, he thinks, as he pours crepe batter into the pan. A king's strongest defenders. They both mean _safety_.

That's the best thought of all.

Nate wanders over as he's tying his hair back, and Eliot catches him almost staring, a strange expression on his face. Then he blinks and it's gone, and Nate is grumbling again as though they can't all see right through him. Hardison and Parker have him wrapped around their little fingers, though they don't take advantage of it often.

Sophie joins them just as the first crepe comes out of the pan—it's for Nate, of course; Eliot's still hoping that the best way to even a mastermind's heart is through his stomach, and so far it seems to be working pretty well, if the small, private smile Nate gives him is any indication. The team takes their seats around the table, settling in, and Eliot feels himself settle a little, too. There's a storm outside, and a cruel world full of wolves, but here, in the safety of Nate's house and company and brilliant regard, they're a family in a way none of them have ever really had before.

That's more than enough, no matter how the future turns out.

* * *

They don't return the chess pieces. The little figures are special now, almost blessed, like holy relics dropped by their patron saint. Eliot watches Nate watch the crew, and knows that the mastermind sees but will never quite comprehend what he is to them.

Eliot doesn't leave, even when the others do. He stays by the window, and watches as Nate picks up the black king from the chessboard. He holds it for a moment, not exactly smiling, but then, it's not really something to smile about. Eliot hesitates for a second, wavering between the two courses of action he can see here, and then puts down his book and walks carefully, deliberately over to the couch to sit down beside Nate.

Nate looks over at him, and then he does smile, a smile Eliot has never seen before. He wants to taste it, to see if it's really as sweet as it looks.

And then, because he's a knight, because he's a rook, because he's steady and brave and unpredictable and immovable all at once, he does.

As it turns out, it's just as sweet as he expected.


End file.
